I don’t like where this is going.
“So I was thinking,” he continues, “we should do something to observe Spirit Day here at our school. I mean, nothing huge or anything. Just put up a couple of posters and hand out leaflets in the next ten days, and ask people to show their support of LGBTQ youth by wearing something purple on October 20. So what do you think?”
He looks at me with a wide grin and big, twinkly eyes as if he’s just told me he figured out how to reverse climate change, end world hunger, and cure cancer all at once.
“Oh, I don’t know,” I say.
He was obviously expecting me to fling my arms around his neck and thank him for his willingness to fight the good fight on behalf of all LGBTQ people. Now that this isn’t happening, he eyes me suspiciously.
“What do you mean, you don’t know?” he says, and without giving me the chance to reply, he drones on. “You’ve seen what happened when that video of you and Phil went around, right? I mean, you suffered a bit of abuse and ridicule, but you’re a big boy. You can handle it. But look what they did to Phil. He’s vulnerable, more so than you or me, and you’ve seen what they did to him. I really think the good and decent people of this school—the majority, no doubt—should stand up against bullying and … I don’t know, make a difference. I really want to do this for Phil, you know?”
“Good luck with that,” I say with a wry smile.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing,” I say, waving my hand dismissively. I really don’t want to go into the details how Phil clearly doesn’t want other people to fight his fights for him, or explain to Chris how I know this, because I’m still trying to come to terms with Phil’s stupid stubbornness myself. “I just think Phil and I received enough attention last week, and to be honest, we’re both kinda glad that after the weekend people seem to have moved on. I really don’t know that we should put ourselves out there again and remind people why everyone made fun of us in the first place. We want to move on too, rather than revisit last week, you know?””
“I see,” he says, visibly disappointed. “Look, nobody’s expecting you to be the poster boys of a campaign or anything. I just thought you’d appreciate the effort, that’s all. Because I think it’s a really important issue, you know?”
“I know.”
“Anyway, I think I’m gonna go through with it. It’s a good thing. Give a voice to people who can’t make themselves heard.” Taking another drag from his cigarette, he looks at me. “Or don’t want to.”
I ignore the obvious jab at me and look at my watch. “We ought to be going. We don’t want Coach Gutierrez yelling at us again.”
Without a word, Chris drops his cigarette on the floor, grinds it out with his shoe, and we start moving.
* * *
I can hear their voices before I even open the front door. They’re familiar and female, both of them, and from the sounds of it, there is no love lost between them. When I enter the house, Greg is coming down the stairs. I look at him quizzically, but he raises his eyebrows and his hands, shaking his head and mouthing, ‘I don’t know.’
“I honestly can’t believe you would stoop so low, Mom!” Zoey says. “You should be ashamed of yourself!”
“Now wait a minute, young lady,” Mom shouts back. “You are not gonna talk to me like that. I’m your mother. And I’m his mother, and it’s my job to protect my children. Now, I’m terribly sorry you don’t like the way I’m doing it, but excuse me, you don’t know the first thing about the pressure and responsibility that comes with being a parent!”
“What’s going on?” I say as I enter the kitchen, the tone in my voice making it clear I’m not merely asking out of curiosity. I’m demanding to know, because I’m obviously the topic of this heated debate.
As their heads turn, Mom says, “Matt!” as if she’s surprised to see me in my own home.
“Your mother,” Zoey says with disdain in her voice, “just tried to hire my services as a spy. She wants me to keep an eye on you and Phil and tell her whenever one of you farts or something, I don’t even know.”
I look at Mom. “What?”
Greg whistles through his teeth as he opens the fridge to get something to drink.
“Gregory, go to your room,” Mom says.
Looking at Greg, I say, “You will stay right here.”
Greg is visibly confused as to why I’m taking his side, although that’s not exactly what I’m doing, but right now my mom’s enemy is my friend.
“Greg has nothing to do with this.” She looks at him. “Gregory, get something to drink and then go back to your room. I mean it.”
“Greg has everything to do with it,” I say. “Because right now you are using him as a pawn in your perfidious game to distract from the real issue here.”
“Matthew Elliot Dunstan, I’m not having you talk to me like—”
“And I’m not having you call one of my friends’ parents and tell them their son is gay! How is this even any of your business?”
Her eyes wide open, Zoey looks at Mom and says, “You did what?”
“She called Phil’s parents yesterday and told them about us. They had no idea of course.”
“Wow,” Zoey says. “Just wow, Mom.”
Meanwhile, Greg grabs a bag of popcorn from the snacks cupboard, sits down at the table and starts munching, looking back and forth between Zoey, Mom, and me. Greg hates popcorn. He’s making a point, silently, brilliantly, and it almost makes me like him again.
“They have a right to know,” Mom tries to justify herself.
“No, they don’t,” I say. “Remember when Zoey had her first boyfriend sleeping over? That Marvin guy?”
“Martin,” Zoey corrects me.
“Whatever. I don’t remember you calling his parents to discuss their relationship.”
Mom shakes her head in despair. “That was completely different.”
“How?” I ask. “How was it different? Other than the fact that they weren’t, you know, gay.”
“Matthew,” Mom says quietly, “I really think we should discuss this in private when your father gets home.”
“Oh, now you’re concerned about privacy all of a sudden? Give me a break, Mom! Nobody’s been giving a rat’s ass about anybody’s privacy in the last couple of days, so why start now?”
Mom turns away, speechless and on the verge of tears.
“I can’t believe you did that, Mom,” Zoey says. “Remember that chat we had after that video of Matt and Phil went viral? How you told me that nobody should be denied the right to come out of the closet on their own terms and when they’re ready for it? What happened to that?”
Slamming her hand on the counter top, Mom says, “This is not about anyone being gay!” She turns back around and looks at Zoey and me. “Do you really think Phil’s parents didn’t already know he’s gay? I mean, come on, a blind person can see that.”
“So what was it about then?” I ask.
“Look, Matthew,” Mom says, “we only want the best for you, don’t you understand?”
I look at her, and suddenly my linguistic instinct kicks in, that innate primal urge to pick people’s sentences apart and to strip away all the smoke and mirrors to see what they’re really saying, and then it strikes me.
We only want your best is one thing.
We only want the best for you is quite another.
Most people probably wouldn’t even notice the difference, but I’m not most people.
Words matter to me.
“Oh, I understand,” I say. “I understand perfectly well. You think Phil is not good enough for me because he’s weird and Asian and not the kind of immaculate, handsome Prince Charming you’ve secretly been dreaming of. You’re worried what people will think when you have to tell them, ‘This is my son’s boyfriend.’ You’re afraid that they’ll think, ‘Oh my, couldn’t Matthew do any better for himself?’ Well, screw them, and screw you. Whom I choose to be or not to be my boyfri
end is none of your business, just like it wasn’t grandma and grandpa’s business to decide if Dad was good enough for you. They hated him when you first brought him home, but you didn’t care. Just like I don’t care what you think about Phil, so here’s my advice for you: Get. Off. My. Back!”
You could hear a pin drop if it weren’t for Greg noisily munching away on his popcorn. In Mom’s concrete face cracks are beginning to show, and she’s either going to blow up in my face or burst into tears any moment now. I’m not sure I can handle either, so I turn around, ready to stomp out of the kitchen, but Dad is standing in the doorway, blocking my way. I’m not sure how long he’s been standing there or how much he’s heard, and at this point I don’t even care.
“Excuse me,” I say as I squeeze my way past him and head toward the stairs.
* * *
Dad gives me about half an hour to cool down before he comes knocking. “Hey, buddy,” he says, sticking his head in the door. “You got a couple of minutes? I need help with the car.”
Lying on my bed, I frown at him. “What?”
“I have to change the timing belt on the Highlander, and I need a hand.”
“Are you sure you got the right room? Greg’s one door down.”
“Greg is busy helping your mother in the garden,” Dad says.
“Should I help Mom instead? Greg’s much better with cars and everything.”
Dad rolls his eyes and sighs. “Look, Matthew, the car is a false pretense so I can have an innocuous chat with you about awkward topics, all right?”
“Oh,” I say.
“You might want to put on an old shirt, this could get messy, and you don’t want a lecture from your mom about the difficulties of removing oil stains. I’ve already heard it, and trust me, it’s not pretty. Anyway, I’ll see you down in the garage.”
He closes the door, leaving me with a smile. I appreciate his effort to sound casual. Nevertheless, I feel apprehensive about the impending conversation. I put on a plain black T-shirt because I figure no one will even notice any oil stains on it, and I make my way down to the garage where the hood of Dad’s Highlander is propped open and Dad is bending over what I assume is the engine. Unsure what else to do, I put my head under the hood as well to see what Dad is doing.
“So what’s a timing belt?” I ask.
“The timing belt,” he points at a rubber belt with teeth on its inside surface, “synchronizes the crankshaft and the camshaft to make sure the engine’s valves open and close at the proper times.”
I have no idea what the man is talking about. Feeling completely inadequate in my role as my dad’s firstborn son, I say, “Right, I knew that.”
“It’s a rubber belt, as you can see, so it doesn’t last forever. If and when it fails, the engine will shut off, and we don’t want that.”
“Nope,” I say, shaking my head in agreement.
“So we change the timing belt every thirty thousand miles. Hand me the wrench, will you?”
Relieved he’s not asking for a more obscure type of tool, I turn to the work bench and confidently pick the wrench from among a million other tools whose names I don’t even know.
“Thanks,” Dad says as I put the wrench in his hand, and he starts … wrenching. He removes a nut and hands it to me. It’s black and greasy, and now so are my fingers.
“You want me to hold on to it or … ?”
“Put it on the bench,” he says, “it’s gonna be a while. But make sure you’ll find it again.”
“Okay.”
I place the nut on the bottom right corner of the workbench. When I turn back to Dad, he hands me the wrench and a second nut and plunges his hands back into the depths of the engine compartment. As I put the nut next to the first one and the wrench back where I picked it up, Dad says, “You know your mom and I love you, right?”
So here we go. The innocuous chat about awkward topics is off to an easy start because there aren’t really that many options to answer this presumably rhetoric question.
“I guess?” I say, shrugging my shoulders which Dad can’t see because he’s focused on getting the old timing belt out.
“We want you to be happy,” he continues, “but we also want you to be safe.” His voice is sounding strained because apparently that timing belt is being stubborn. “And by safe I mean not just safe from physical harm but also from mocking and ridicule and whatnot. You know, bullying, basically.”
“I know.”
The removed timing belt in his hand, he comes crawling from under the hood and looks at me. “Your mom and I never had a problem with gay people, you know? I mean, we have gay friends, and we support gay marriage and everything. Having a generally very liberal attitude like that is one thing, but as it turns out, when your own kids come into play, things suddenly look different. Look, if you’re gay, you’re gay, and that’s fine. Sexual orientation is not a choice, so there’s nothing anyone can—or should—do about it. But for your mom it’s a bit much all at once.”
“A bit much of what?” I ask.
“Of everything,” he says as he discards the timing belt in the trash and wipes his hands on a dirty old rag. “Come on, buddy, you know your mom. She was hoping for a beautiful fairy tale wedding for you one day, with a beautiful princess, and now it turns out the princess is a prince—”
“And he’s not even beautiful, is that it?”
“Look, buddy, as far as I’m concerned Philip seems to be a perfectly decent guy, and it’s not his fault that he looks the way he does. But your mom … just give her some time, okay? She’ll come around.”
My hands buried deep in my pockets I just nod.
“Your mom’s scared, you know?”
I frown at him. “What, scared of Phil?”
“No, not scared of Phil,” he says, shaking his head. “She’s scared of how people respond to him. After what happened last week … how Phil got roughed up after school, I mean … this kind of thing is pretty worrying, you know? Gay marriage may be legal, but that doesn’t mean everyone loves gay people now. It’s a rough world, and there are some pretty disagreeable people out there. Like it or not, but people like Phil are easy targets. Easier than most. Your mom, I think, is afraid that what happened to Phil will happen to you when you and Phil are together.”
“That’s very nice and all,” I say almost defiantly, “but I think I can take care of myself.”
He moves a step closer and puts his arm around my shoulders. “You know that, and I know that, but your mom … to her you’ll always be her little baby that she needs to protect. It’s what moms do. I know it must feel awkward or maybe even embarrassing when you’re trying to grow up and be your own person, but you have to understand she’s not doing it out of spite or to make your life more difficult or because she doesn’t have anything else to do. She’s doing it because she loves you and because she cares about you.”
I sigh. “I know. But asking Zoey to spy on me is just out of line.”
“About that,” Dad says, “I think this was a bit blown out of proportion by your sister. Spying is a big word. After you told us what happened to Philip the other day, your mom was worried that something similar might happen to you and that you wouldn’t tell us. But if you get bullied or assaulted, we have a right to know, Matthew. All your mom asked of Zoey was to let us know when something happens to you. It doesn’t even have anything to do with you and Phil being … what are you, actually? Boyfriends? Friends with benefits? Fuck buddies?”
Shocked, I writhe out of Dad’s embrace. “Dad!”
“Hey!” he says, raising his hands. “I’m making an effort here. Just trying to be open minded.”
I shiver in mock disgust, and covering my face with my hands to conceal an embarrassed smile, I say, “Please … don’t.”
Chuckling, Dad reaches out his arm and hauls me back in. “Come here, you,” he says, ruffling my hair with his grease-stained hand. “Your mom and I, we both love you, you know?”
“I know. I lo
ve you too.”
He ruffles my hair some more and kisses me on the head. Then he puts his hands on my shoulders, looks me in the eyes and says, “You should go and tell your mom. She kind of thinks you hate her right now.”
“Yeah, I guess. But first—”
I turn around and grab the new timing belt from the workbench. When I turn back, I shriek at the sight of Mom standing in the back of the garage, leaning against the door frame, her arms crossed, her eyes glazed over. “Jesus!” I say. “How long have you been standing there?”
“Long enough,” she says, her voice cracking.
“Honestly,” I say, “all this sneaking up on people in this house needs to stop.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
When I enter the Korova, the place is nearly empty but for three hipster students hovering over their laptops and sipping their lattes as they sit at the small tables lining the shop front facing Madison, and a lesbian couple feeding each other cheesecake in—of all places—what used to be our regular booth. Or maybe it still is, I don’t know. It’s been a while since I’ve found myself enjoying company at the Korova. My friendship with Chris has been going through a considerable cooling-off period, and outside the school cafeteria and the track we haven’t been spending a whole lot of time together in the last two weeks. I’m not sure if it’s because he’s disappointed by my lack of active support of his Spirit Day campaign or because he’s trying to give me some space so I can develop my relationship with Phil. Not that there have been any significant developments. We no longer have any classes together, but it might be just a matter of time until they put me in special ed, too, because I keep zoning out in class more and more often, and since Phil’s term paper in Mrs. Spelczik’s English class has become obsolete, we don’t really have a reason to hang out outside of school anymore.
Unless you consider being boyfriends a reason, but really, who does that?
Cupid Painted Blind Page 28
